Subj : Newsline Part 3 To : ALL USERS From : DARYL STOUT Date : Thu Nov 26 2015 08:07 am KICKER: SANTA AT THE NORTH DIPOLE? [ANCHOR/DON:] We conclude this week's report with a Christmas story that begins, as all good Christmas stories must, with the wish of a child. What started as a staged report from Santa's Sleigh during an amateur radio Net on 80 meters nine years ago has grown. And grown. More from Amateur Radio Newsline's Kent Peterson, KC0DGY: [KENT]: If you take an 80 meter rag chew net, add a bit of holiday cheer, and Pete Thompson, KE5GGY, explains what comes next. {PETE]: It really goes back to a year where I had a young child at home, I was checked into one of the 3916 nets on Christmas Eve. A number of us were looking for a way for our kids to talk to Santa. So we pieced together something for a couple of us that one night, and it worked really well. I could be a Santa net relay for a station in Kansas City then he could facilitate the contact with Santa for me and my son, so we had sort of a primitive dress rehearsal, and I think it occurred to a number of us that, hey, this really is neat, and it has grown from there. I think we had five people that first year, now in 2015, we are expecting 250 and 300 kids to talk to Santa. [KENT]: Thompson says running the net has its rewards. [PETE]: Connecting kids to Santa at Christmas time just makes their Christmas. We get emails every year from parents and grandparents that say this was the highlight of our holiday season. This brought our family together. That and the fact we're using the magic radio to do it, makes it very rewarding on another level. We know a number of these kids who have been on the Santa net, have gone on to get their ham radio tickets. It's a win win. Kids get the spirit of Christmas connecting with Santa through the magic of ham radio, they experience this great hobby, it's a great way for us to end the year on the 3916 nets. [KENT]: Thompson fired up his ham rig to demonstrate the quality of the Santa connection. [PETE]: Right now I've got a connection with Santa so we could close this interview with a couple comments from Santa. Let me see if I can get him on my phone patch in Dallas. Santa Santa, this is KE5GGY from Denton County calling, Santa can you come onM and give a couple of comments to the Amateur Radio Newsline. Calling Santa. ["SANTA"]: HO HO HO!! Hello There!! Merry Christmas to everyone listening to the Amateur Radio Newsline. And, ho ho ho! And, I know you've all been very good boys and girls this year, and I just want to invite you to join the hams on 3916 every night at 7:30 for the Santa net. And yes, I could talk to you so we'll see you then. And until then, 73, from Santa. Ho Ho Ho! In case you just missed that info, the 80 meter Santa Net meets every night on 3916 KHz at 7:30PM US Central time. For the Amateur Radio Newsline, I'm Kent Peterson, KC0DGY [DON's TAGLINE]: This year Thompson will stream the audio for a live feed on the Internet, and it will be archived. So anyone who is on the Santa Net, through Christmas Eve, will be able to find their contact from a YouTube page, just do a hashtag and a call sign and you'll find that particular contact. ** NEWSCAST CLOSE With thanks to Alan Labs; AMSAT; the ARRL; the BBC; CQ Magazine; Hap Holly and the Rain Report; IEEE, The Irish Radio Transmitter Society; northjersey.com; KE5GGY Blog; the Ohio-Penn DX Newsletter; Radio Society of Great Britain; The South African Radio League; Southgate Amateur Radio News; the 3916 Nets; TWiT TV; Young Hamsters; Youngsters On the Air, and you, our listeners, that's all from the Amateur Radio Newsline. Our email address is newsline@arnewsline.org. More information is available at Amateur Radio Newsline's only official website located at www.arnewsline.org. You can also write to us or support us at Amateur Radio Newsline, 28197 Robin Avenue, Santa Clarita, CA 91350. For now, with Caryn Eve Murray, KD2GUT, at the news desk in New York, and our news team worldwide, I'm Don Wilbanks, AE5DW, in Picayune, Mississippi, saying 73, and as always, we thank you for listening. Amateur Radio Newsline(tm) is Copyright 2015. All rights reserved. --- BgNet 1.0a12 - The Thunderbolt BBS wx1der.dyndns.org Little Rock, AR .